bwgood77 wrote:Ghost of Kleine wrote:bwgood77 wrote:
But it doesn't create cap space, and Beal is definitely the superior player who is actually far more healthy.
Not by itself of course as there'd need to be some follow-up trades if that was the only singular goal. But what it could do that so many people here seem to be willfully ignoring is..................................
1- As a 40 million expiring, it could actually provide us with options that we currently just don't have with Beal as is. Again, right now we really have no options to make roster adjustments because thanks to our front office being completely delusional, going to the extreme, and giving away all of our assets and space, etc. we're completely stuck in a hopeless situation outside of maybe trading one of KD, Booker, or convincing Beal to agree to a trade anyways!
- It could provide us an out from Beal's 50+ million salary and even though (by itself) it obviously wouldn't get us cap space, it would clearly give us a springboard towards getting under the 2nd apron and start creating avenues to actually make adjustments that we're currently prohibited from.
- It'd give us a 40 million expiring that we could flip elsewhere to another tax team that is seeking cap reduction or tax relief in exchange for actual better depth pieces than we constantly field from the vet min options.
- IF he was able/willing to play (in a very implied role) absent of significant pressure, He'd give us a 6'11 mobile jumbo wing forward with size that actually has defensive acumen, ballhandling ability, and playmaking ability. All of these things are obviously things that our team is sorely missing anyways. We don't really need more offensive weapons anyways, and in removing that offensive pressure from the equation with Simmons, it might allow him to feel comfortable and focus on defense, ballhandling, and playmaking, while also not needing, wanting, or dominating the ball when it's clearly much better in Booker and Durants' hands anyways. I'm talking about placing him in a very simplified role that accentuates his natural abilities that he's already proven to excel at previously in his career.
I really can't understand how people keep overlooking the value in these considerations when currently as is, our team has none of these options and clearly isn't a legitimate contender anyways. And honestly, If people just can't stomach the idea of these possibilities under that condition, we can again easily just flip Simmons expiring to some team that is seeking significant cap relief or tax reduction for multiple depth pieces obviously better than what our vet min retread options would provide.
Seems like people continue to view expirings as some sort of good thing or valuable asset. Usually what you can get for an expiring is a player on that a team doesn't want because they are not on a good contract (eg, Beal). He WAS that player we got for an expiring. We won't likely find anything nearly as good.
As far as bad contract, cap relief, second apron, etc....it's not my money so I am not concerned like some about saving Ishbia money. The only year his contract will matter and hurt us bad is the year after KD expires, IF we don't re-sign KD, but knowing Ishbia, he will re-sign KD to a 4 year contract when he's 38. Or, when Beal is an expiring, maybe we can flip him for another bad contract people will complain about.
Well, with the new CBA being so restrictive and penalizing, I'd like to believe it could still be viewed as somewhat valuable to teams that like us either went all in only to come up short and want to make changes to their rosters' soon, but don't have cap flexibility to make moves either, OR maybe some teams that have one or more (possibly multiple players on multi-year deals that they'd now like to move on from possibly. Or maybe a team just wants to bottom out knowing that the 25' draft is pretty loaded with high-end talent and star potential, and obviously, Simmons could be swapped for players to become that team's tank commander just sitting out the season until he expires?
There could be numerous reasons that a team could have possible interest in a $40 million expiring like Simmons. For example, maybe some contenders have just realized that despite signing a bunch of players to multi-year deals, they're still not legit contenders (too bad our front office can't comprehend this)! And now they might be looking to get off some of their longer deals. Names like Andrew Wiggins, Draymond Green, Terry Rozier, and Khris Middleton. Would Atlanta maybe want to get off a couple of their long-term deals? Would Portland like to move off any long-term deals so they can bottom out? Is Utah still looking to move off of Collins? As we head into next season, I think there could be a number of teams looking to change course or make moves in some fashion.
Overall, I'm not averse to keeping Beal, as I do like the energy and tenacity he brings and would much rather trade KD and use those assets to strengthen our depth whilst also getting assets back as well and maybe move forward with a backcourt of Beal and Booker while adding some dominant, ATHLETIC and PHYSICAL frontcourt presence for BOTH to play off of with more of a pick your poison that isn't mostly redundant. That's why I was partial to a KD to New York for Randle/ Bojan/ picks or KD for Randle/Mitchell/ Mcbride/ Sims/ picks type of deal, because Randle and Nurkic together in the frontcourt would give us two big burly, physical tough and gritty frontcourt bigs that are great rebounders, highly productive, and BOTH can pass well and help initiate offense, which would take some playmaking pressure off of Booker and Beal in the backcourt. And then they could focus more successfully on scoring. Beal on his downhill drives to the hoop, with some passing thrown in, and Booker back at shooting guard knocking down big shots! Really, we'd just need to shore up our wing defense with a jumbo defensive wing, and our backup center slot and we'd be good.